Global litigation funder IMF Bentham Ltd. has signed on to finance its first international commercial arbitration in Singapore, thought to be one of the first examples of funded international arbitration in the city-state since the passage of legislation last year that opened the door to outside funding.

President Donald Trump has picked a new trade fight over imports of steel and aluminum, but experts say it is the nation's booming agricultural sector that could end up taking the brunt of the damage if major U.S. allies begin retaliating.

An English High Court judge on Thursday found that a London tribunal lacks jurisdiction to hear a nearly $70 million arbitration against a Chinese company that was allegedly acting as guarantor for a shipping company that backed out of a charter agreement, concluding the underlying guarantee agreement had never been authorized.

President Donald Trump’s looming threat to slap hefty tariffs on imported steel and aluminum is the most aggressive trade enforcement maneuver yet from an administration that has had many of them, and one that experts say may pose a significant threat to the global trading order.

Russian natural gas giant Gazprom said Thursday that it would defend its rights after arbitrators in Stockholm awarded Ukraine's national oil and gas company a net $2.56 billion following a dispute over a 10-year gas purchase deal.

A New York Supreme Court judge has disqualified King & Spalding LLP from representing an animal health company in international arbitration, ruling that its past work with the company's adversaries in the case presents a conflict.

Ukraine's national oil and gas company said Wednesday it has prevailed in arbitration in Stockholm over Russian natural gas giant Gazprom following a dispute over a 10-year gas purchase deal, resulting in a net payment by the Russian company to the Ukrainian company of $2.56 billion.

The Trump administration released the broad strokes of its 2018 trade agenda Wednesday in a document that mostly stuck to the White House’s key priorities of reshaping U.S. trade agreements, ramping up enforcement and applying pressure on the World Trade Organization.

Serbia has settled a 15-year-old dispute with Greek industrial conglomerate Mytilineos SA that arose when a Serbian state-controlled entity that operates one of the world's largest copper mining complexes allegedly defaulted on several owed payments, prompting an international tribunal to issue a $40 million arbitral award against the country.

In Law360's latest glimpse at the World Trade Organization's Dispute Settlement Body proceedings, the U.S. delegation digs in its heels to stonewall the appointment of new Appellate Body members, and members continue quarreling over disputes involving chicken, solar subsidies and other items.

Mexico has fired back at U.S. investors bringing a $100 million arbitration claim over the alleged destruction of their gambling business, arguing they cannot continue with the proceeding as they've failed to properly identify every claimant, a requirement under NAFTA.

The U.S. Department of Commerce finalized a set of tariffs Tuesday on imports of Chinese aluminum foil, fueling an ongoing World Trade Organization battle between trading giants China and the United States that could have serious implications for Washington's enforcement efforts against Beijing.

Venezuela's state-owned oil company on Monday threw cold water on Crystallex International Corp.'s efforts in Delaware federal court to tie a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision regarding the victims of a 1997 Hamas bombing to the Canadian miner's own efforts to enforce a $1.2 billion arbitral award, arguing that the two have nothing in common.

A revised version of the Trans-Pacific Partnership released last week that maintains a provision for investor-state arbitration is a win for investors because it shows that the 11 remaining nations in the trade pact continue to see the value in this dispute resolution mechanism, experts say.

The CEO of a South Africa-based mining company said Monday that he's looking to initiate talks with the Tanzanian government to end an impasse over arbitration challenging the country's new mining laws, according to an interview with Bloomberg.

The Vietnamese government has launched a World Trade Organization dispute targeting the U.S. process for inspecting catfish imports, making good on years of legal threats against the controversial program, according to documents circulated on Tuesday.

A team of scholars from Georgetown University came forward Tuesday with proposals to resolve the World Trade Organization’s persistent struggle to fill three vacant seats on its seven-member Appellate Body, stressing that urgent action is needed to save the panel from outright catastrophe.

East Timor and Australia have finalized an agreement in a maritime border dispute and established a "pathway" to develop offshore gas fields located between the two countries, which hold nearly 230 million barrels of condensate oil, the Permanent Court of Arbitration said on Sunday.

Spanish telecom giant Telefónica SA has launched arbitration proceedings in the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes against Colombia, months after the company said it would raise €472 million ($581 million) to pay off a $529 million arbitration award issued over unreturned telecom assets.

Expert Analysis

While technology is making certain aspects of e-discovery faster and easier, it is also creating new challenges as quickly as we can provide solutions. The good news is that there are concrete steps businesses can take to address those challenges, says Peter Ostrega of Consilio LLC.

Procedures for dealing with doping are not well established and are not at all uniform from sport to sport. The current situation is chaotic — it is not known until the last minute who will be competing and it is not known for years who actually medaled in the competitions. A new system is needed, says Ronald Katz of GCA Law Partners LLP.

Smart law firms are increasingly positioning professionals to proactively guide them as the legal landscape reshapes itself, harnessing six emerging roles within their organizational charts to embrace new approaches, tools and systems, says Rob MacAdam of HighQ.

As the economic situation in Venezuela continues to deteriorate and the number of bond defaults continues to mount, the Third Circuit’s recent ruling against Crystallex is a poignant reminder about the challenges of recovering on claims against a determined sovereign. However, Crystallex is not without further litigation options, say Richard Cooper and Boaz Morag of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP.

While each new year is expected to bring fresh challenges to the legal industry, 2018 will be particularly disruptive to the status quo. Both law firms and organizations that cater to the legal community should prepare for developments like increasing pressure from international clients and data security risks caused by multigenerational gaps, says Jeff Ton of Bluelock LLC.

Jay Greenberg and Max Volsky, co-founders of litigation finance platform LexShares Inc., analyze emerging trends based on conversations with their investors and executives in this rapidly evolving sector.

Study of the Enneagram personality typing system can provide attorneys with better insights into themselves, and into those they interact with professionally, including clients, opposing counsel and judges, says Jennifer Gibbs of Zelle LLP.

John Greenya’s new book, “Gorsuch: The Judge Who Speaks for Himself,” offers readers something the confirmation hearings did not — the backstory of Neil Gorsuch and a glimpse of who Justice Gorsuch is, says Chief Judge Timothy Tymkovich of the Tenth Circuit.